Behind Locked Doors: A History of the Papal Elections

by Frederic J. Baumgartner

Since 1600, whenever a Pope dies, the Cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church convene in Rome to elect a successor. The Papal Conclave is an event like no other. Highly secret and conducted behind the locked doors of the Sistine Chapel, it happens about eight times every century. It is an event that has evolved over the centuries and is always filled with high cardinals meeting en masse in their scarlet robes, throngs of the faithful standing watch in St. Peter's Square, the black or white smoke billowing from the chimney signalling the election of a new Pontiff Since secrecy was not heavily invoked until the twentieth century, there is a vast store of rich material to work from and Fred Baumgartner uses it to its utmost detailing the bickering and blatant politicking that goes on behind the locked doors of the Sistine Chapel in this important and timely book.

Genres: History, Religion, Catholic

288 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2003

About the author

A specialist in the history of early modern France, Frederic Baumgartner is Professor of History at Virginia Tech University.

Reviews

[Evan Þ.]

This book was a fun read, but it only fulfilled half my expectations. The book is essentially a list of each pope and how he was elected, turned into narrative and filled out with a series of anecdotes about them and their elections. The author does point out common threads within each period, but the sheer length of time makes each thread or character only valid for a chapter at most. Perhaps this's unavoidable, unless you try to make the Holy Spirit (Who allegedly superintends these elections) a character?

[Renee]

I was really looking forward to reading this, but was disappointed. It is not structured very well. I would have liked it to have been a bit more organized by pope or something, it just rambled on from one pope to the next without much differentiation. As another reviewer said, it is a reference book, not a recommended read.

[David]

Don't buy. It's a reference book. A list. I bought it on false pretenses, thinking it was a history.

[Margaret]

I never realized how dangerous it was to be the pope until I read this book on the death of Pope John Paul II. Some of the history is a bit tedious, but the chronology is still interesting!